Exploring development and accountability: laying the basis for a local governance performance index in Tanzania

This briefing paper summarises findings around the key questions of what ‘development’ means at the local level, who is responsible for it, and how local government can be held to account in practice. Findings are illustrated with selected quotes from interviews, focus groups and workshops, which demonstrate the challenges that need to be overcome to design and implement a performance index.

Read More

Exploring the Links Between Poverty and Disability in Rural Bangladesh

This paper explores the links between poverty and disability drawing from 60 qualitative life-history interviews conducted in rural Bangladesh, in 48 households, in three districts, in March 2016. The paper provides insights into the relationship between poverty and disability with the aim of informing policy and practice concerned with both reducing poverty and improving the life chances of people with disabilities.

Author: Peter Davis

Read More

A tale of triple disadvantages: Disability and poverty dynamics amongst women in rural Bangladesh

The focus of the paper is on persistently poor women with disabilities in Bangladesh. It seeks to contribute to the disability and chronic poverty policy discourse and work towards developing effective poverty reduction measures by investigating daily activities and coping strategies of poor persons with disabilities.

Author: Vidya Diwakar

Read More

Anti-discrimination measures in education: A comparative policy analysis

Efforts to tackle discrimination in access to basic services have shown mixed results in different country settings. This study examines the positive and negative outcomes attributed to anti-discrimination measures adopted in different country contexts and analyses the factors contributing to these outcomes, with a specific focus on anti-discrimination measures in education.

Read More

Exploring lines of blame and accountability in local service delivery

The selection of indicators for the creation of an index is critical if it is to be used as a mechanism to hold local government to account. Clear lines of responsibility and accountability need to be incorporated into the selection of indicators so the index can be applied at the local level.

Read More

Household economic diversification: Policies to support smallholder agriculture, the rural nonfarm economy and casual wage labour

The purpose of this Working Paper is to explore a menu of policy recommendations to support smallholder agriculture, the rural nonfarm economy and casual wage labour. Developing country governments could use these recommendations to think through their policy-making decisions and ensure the poorest people participate in economic growth on good terms, such that they can sustainably escape poverty.

Author: Andrew Shepherd

Read More

Getting the long-term macro development perspective right: Diversification of the economy with strategic investment and increased protection from risks

The purpose of this Working Paper is to explore a menu of policy recommendations that developing country governments can use to think through their policy-making decisions and ensure the poorest people participate in economic growth on good terms, such that they can sustainably escape poverty.

Authors: Chiara Mariotti and Andrew Shepherd

Read More

Do Anti-Discrimination Measures Reduce Poverty Among Marginalised Social Groups?

This report is a rigorous review of 470 pieces of evidence on the effectiveness of anti-discrimination measures in low and middle-income countries. The review focuses on women and girls, children, young people, disabled people, marginalised ethnic and racial groups and marginalised castes.

Read More

How can public policy enhance female employment and empower women economically as countries urbanize?

Urbanisation and labour force participation can be powerful drivers of women economic empowerment. This paper reviews the empowering and disempowering effects of urbanisation on the the main areas of work performed by women in cities and analyses the interventions which have been implemented to support the different types of female urban livelihoods

Read More

Good governance, local government, accountability and service delivery in Tanzania

A performance index for local governance in Tanzania needs to provide a clear indication of how effectively local government and partners are delivering public services, supporting livelihoods and ensuring peace and security.  This paper sets out the context of good governance, local governance, accountability and local service delivery in Tanzania.  

Authors: Anna Mdee and Lisa Thorley

Read More

Improving the delivery of public services What role could a local governance index play?

One of the most powerful ideas in development in recent years has been good governance. This review of available evidence considers how the performance of local governance can be improved in relation to the better delivery of services, through the use of a local governance performance index. It also considers how the public tracking of locally meaningful measures of governance can be used to improve the accountability of local government bureaucracies and politicians.

Authors: Anna Mdee and Lisa Thorley

Read More

Compatible or contradictory? The challenge of inclusive structural economic and environmental transformation

Multiple transformations are being sought in our societies in the face of the accelerating risk of climate change and the need to eradicate poverty. This paper sets out to explore current evidence and debate on structural economic transformation and environmental (green) transformation in relation to the eradication of poverty. 

Authors: Anna Mdee, Richard Emmott and Alberto Lemma

Read More

Ensuring Escapes from Poverty are Sustained in Rural Ethiopia

This report examines why some households in Ethiopia are able to escape poverty and remain out of it—that is, they experience sustained escapes from poverty—while others escape poverty only to return to living in it again – that is, they experience transitory escapes. The report investigates the resources (land, livestock, and value of assets), attributes (household composition and education level), and activities (including jobs, engagement in non-farm activities and migration) of households that enable them to escape poverty sustainably and minimize the likelihood of returning to living in poverty again.
Authors: Chiara Mariotti and Vidya Diwakar
 

Read More

Conference Report - CPAN-ADB Conference on Pro-poorest Growth and the SDGs: emerging issues

The international community has committed to Leaving No One Behind. This means poverty eradication shouldn’t count as such if certain people are systematically excluded from it. Growth is a key means of implementing these commitments. So how can growth occur in a way which includes the poorest on good terms? These were the premises of the Conference ‘Incorporating Pro-Poorest Growth in the SDGs: Moving Beyond the MDGs’ implemented by CPAN and the Asian Development Bank in Manila in April 2016. 

 

Read More

Ensuring Escapes from Poverty are Sustained in Uganda

Since the early 1990s, Uganda has experienced substantial reductions in poverty. However, as people have moved out of poverty, the number of people living at a level less than twice the poverty line—termed the ‘insecure non-poor’ in the Ugandan context—has risen. This report focuses on ‘transitory poverty escapes’, i.e., on those households which, having successfully escaped from poverty, return to living in it once again. Specifically, it examines why some households are able to escape poverty and remain out of it—that is, they experience sustained escapes from poverty—while others escape poverty only to return to living in it again in the future. 

Authors: Lucy Scott, Vidya Diwakar, Moses Okech

Read More